Open Society Foundations Award Fellowships to 14 Visionaries Working to Reform Criminal Justice in the United States

Recipients include an ordained pastor, lawyers, journalists, and people who have spent time in prison

May 14, 2014 U.S. Programs

Open Society Foundations Award Fellowships to 14 Visionaries Working to Reform Criminal Justice in the United States

NEW YORK—The Open Society Foundations today awarded $1.25 million to the newest class of Soros Justice Fellows working on a range of criminal justice issues, from solitary confinement to DNA databases to police misconduct.

“We are proud to support these extraordinary individuals working to curb mass incarceration and develop new approaches to ensure accountability in the justice system,” said Ken Zimmerman, director of U.S. Programs at the Open Society Foundations. “We hope their projects will spur debate, catalyze change, and lift the curtain on a closed system rife with inequities.”

Fellow recipients include the only “juvenile lifer” ever to be pardoned by the governor in Washington State. Her project will develop the leadership skills of young people in detention so they can better advocate for their rights and lead productive lives upon release.

Another fellow—an ordained pastor in California whose son was sentenced to die in prison and who lost a grandson and nephew to violent crime—will train and mobilize communities directly impacted when young people are charged and sentenced as adults.

The recipients also include an English professor who will promote the use of storytelling in the field of capital defense to reduce executions in the state of Texas, and a journalist who will investigate the rapid growth of for-profit federal prisons used exclusively to hold noncitizens.

To carry out their work, the fellows receive a stipend of $58,700 to $110,250, for full-time projects lasting between 12 and 18 months. Since 1997, more than 300 individuals have received Soros Justice Fellowships to create a more equitable system of justice in the United States.